Case No.: CH/99/1568
Applicant: Bahra CORALIC
Respondent Party: Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Date Delivered: 7 December 2001

DECISION ON ADMISSIBILITY AND MERITS

Factual Background

The applicant has been a judge in Bihac since 1989. On 8 June 1995 she was abducted and badly beaten by three men. On 28 July 1995 these men were taken into custody on suspicion of committing this assault. They were released from custody on 5 September 1995. On 18 March 1999 they were convicted. On 1 October 1997 the applicant brought criminal charges before the Public Prosecutor's Office against the former Chief of Police in connection with the assault. However, he was never indicted. On 15 April 1998 the applicant filed an action for compensation against the three convicted men and the Chief of Police. There has been no final decision in this case to date.

Admissibility

The Chamber found that the application, insofar as it referred to the assault of 8 June 1995 and the positive obligations of the respondent Party to protect the rights of the applicant that were allegedly violated by this assault, fell outside its competence ratione temporis. The Chamber noted that Article 6 did not indicate that the applicant, as a victim of a crime, had a viable claim under that Article. The Chamber therefore found this part of the application, concerning the criminal proceedings, inadmissible, as it was incompatible with the Agreement ratione materiae. The Chamber found that, as regards the applicant's complaints relating to the length of the civil proceedings before the domestic courts, there were no domestic remedies at the applicant's disposal which she could have been required to exhaust. In sum, the Chamber concluded that the application should be accepted and examined on its merits insofar as it concerned the applicant's complaint of a violation of her human rights in light of the allegedly unreasonable length of the civil proceedings.

Merits

Article 6 of the Convention

The Chamber noted that the civil proceedings had been pending for 3 years and 9 months and were still ongoing, and that the case was not so complex as to justify such a long delay. The Chamber found that there did not appear to be any conduct on the part of the applicant which could be considered to have contributed to the delay in the proceedings, but rather that the delays were due to incompetence and inefficiency on the part of the authorities.

Considering that the delay in the civil proceedings was entirely due to the conduct of the Municipal Court, for which the respondent Party was to be held responsible, the Chamber found that the length of time that the applicant's proceedings had been pending before the courts of the respondent Party was unreasonable and that the applicant's right to a fair trial within a reasonable time in the determination of a civil right guaranteed by Article 6(1) had been violated.

Remedies

The Chamber ordered the Federation to take all necessary steps to ensure that the applicant's proceedings before the Municipal Court were decided upon expeditiously and in accordance with the applicant's rights. The Chamber also ordered the Federation to pay to the applicant KM 5,000 by way of compensation for non-pecuniary damage.

Decision adopted 7 November 2001
Decision delivered 7 December 2001

DECISION ON REQUEST FOR REVIEW

As of 31 December 2001, the decision on request for review had not been decided.